REVIEWS. 
On the Germination, Development, and Fructification of the 
Higher Cryptogamia, and on the Fructification of the 
Conifere. By Dr. W1tuE~tm Horrmeister. ‘Translated 
by Freperick Currey, M.A., Sec.L.8. London: printed 
and published for the Ray Society, by Robert Hardwicke. 
Wueruer or not Linneus intended by the term Crypto- 
gamia to express a doubt about the sexuality of flowerless 
plants which one day might be cleared up, there is no doubt 
that many of the earlier observers suspected that the same 
conditions of reproduction existed in the lower as well as the 
higher plants. It was not, however, till the remarkable dis- 
coveries of Suminski with regard to the fructification of ferns, 
and the demonstration, not only of the existence, but of the 
function of sperm-cells and germ-cells in these cryptogams, 
that general attention was drawn to the subject. <A host of 
‘observers have come upon the field, and we are now almost 
in a position to lay it down as a law, that throughout the 
whole vegetable kingdom there is goig on a reproductive 
process, involving the union of two dissimilar cells—a germ- 
cell and a sperm-cell. In the lower cryptogamia there are 
many cases in which this has not been demonstrated; but in 
the higher cryptogamia it has been done for the whole series. 
Science is largely indebted to the labours of Dr. Hoffmeister 
for this result; and he has not only laboured as an original 
observer, but has collected together, with an industry and 
pains-taking diligence which is altogether German, all that 
has been done by others on the subject. His first published 
work on this subject was produced at Leipzig, in 1847. Since 
that period, however, much has been done, and Dr. Hoff- 
meister, in the ‘Transactions’ of the Royal Academy of 
Saxony, and in the ‘ Regensberg Flora,’ has added mueh ori- 
ginal matter to his first observations. In 1852, the Ray So- 
ciety had brought before it a proposition for the translation 
of Hoffmeister’s work. This was, however, not entertained 
at the time, as a London publisher advertised a translation of 
the same. This translation, however, never saw the light ; 
and in 1859 Mr. F. Currey, who was himself well acquainted 
with the subject, undertook to correspond with Dr. Hoff- 
meister on the subject of a translation of his labours on 
